Covid-19 in Bulgaria on April 7: Roundup

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The vote by the
National Assembly of amendments
to the State of Emergency Measures Act on April 6 has left the
country’s Chief State Health Inspector, Associate Professor Angel
Kunchev – a member of the operational headquarters against Covid-19 –
without a salary.

Originally drafted to
donate the salaries of MPs to the fight against Covid-19, the text
was amended to include the Prime Minister, all members of the Cabinet
and their political cabinets. Kunchev is a member of the Health
Minister’s political cabinet.

Operational HQ chief
Major-General Mutafchiyski said that he and Kunchev’s other
colleagues would donate part of their salaries so that the Chief
Health Inspector could get paid.

Major retail chains
in Bulgaria issued a lengthy objection to a draft government
decree requiring them to sell Bulgarian food in at least half the
area of their shops. The Modern Trade Association, which includes
Avanti, Billa Bulgaria, DM Bulgaria, Kaufland and
Lidl Bulgaria among its members, rejected the proposal as against the
fundamental principles of a market economy and said that if it went
ahead, they would object at EU level.

A
large group of taxi drivers from various
companies parked their cars outside Alexander Nevsky cathedral,
demanding government help as their business has been hard-hit by a
sharp decline in the number of customers. They called for state aid
of 1000 leva each, freezing of lease payments, and halving of the fee
for using the system through which they get addresses and get police
assistance in problems created by clients.

About
20 people – cooks, restaurateurs,
bartenders and waiters, gathered for an
impromptu protest outside the Cabinet office. With restaurants, bars
and coffee shops ordered closed, most of the group of protesters were
people who had been sent on unpaid leave or fired.

The
Bulgarian Association for Alternative
Tourism (BAAT) has proposed emergency
measures for the preservation of small and medium-sized businesses,
which it sent to Prime Minister Boiko Borissov and Tourism Minister
Nikolina Angelkova.

BAAT
said that the 60/40 system of government support for employees’
incomes is inapplicable to the tourism industry and different
measures are needed.

The
association is seeking, among other steps, a moratorium on social
insurance payments for the duration of the State of Emergency and six
months beyond it, one-off financial aid to cover refusals of
repayments, deferral of mandatory tour operators liability insurance,
and payment of a lump sum up to 2000 leva for tour guides and
mountain guides left jobless.

A
campaign called #PRAYATHOME
was launched on April 7 by socialist Bulgarian MEP Tsvetelina
Penkova, to encourage people not to gather at churches during the
Easter season. Bulgarian National Television said that the campaign
was aimed at Bulgarian citizens and all European citizens who will
celebrate the different Easters, on April 12 for Protestants and
Roman Catholics and April 19 for the Bulgarian Orthodox Church.

Prime Minister Boiko Borissov and Foreign Minister Ekaterina Zaharieva have both sent messages on Twitter to UK PM Boris Johnson, who is in hospital with Covid-19, wishing him a speedy recovery. Zaharieva and Johnson were counterparts when he was the British Foreign Secretary.

For the rest of The Sofia Globe’s continuing coverage of the Covid-19 situation in Bulgaria,please click here.

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